California
by grazed142
Summary: Sometimes the very thing you wanted to leave behind is what follows you. GSR...ish.
1. California Sun

Like Nevada, the roads in California seemed to stretch to infinity. The longer Sara drove, the more it seemed that every fast food restaurant was only a piece of litter that could be picked up, eliminated by some unseen hand, until all that would be left was road and sky. The sun glared down until every road sign glinted like an emerald. And she drove on. Feeling strangely numb, Sara concentrated on the warmth of the steering wheel beneath her fingers and the practiced optimism of the radio weatherman. Looks like sun in California, he was saying with a cheery Midwestern accent. Sun in California. Her memories of California were filled with sun; sun through open windows, sun on white sea foam, sun on dewy glasses of red Kool-aid. Sun streaming through hospital windows. Sara turned up the volume on the radio and shook the memories of sun out of her head. Within the hour, she arrived in Tamales Bay.

She rented a hotel room by the sea, one with coral-colored walls and bits of sand in the carpet. The only sounds were the waves that advanced, then sunk back, and then called for her again. Sara turned on the TV and, as Oprah conjectured in the background, flipped on the light in the bathroom. It was one of those flickering bathroom lights, and its dull light made her face glimmer like a dying star. Her paleness made her draw back slightly, and she wondered if maybe she was getting sick. But no—it had to be the light. Sara ran a hand through her hair. Was it always this lank? She laid one hand on the cold tile of the sink, feeling slightly unreal. Oprah's voice seemed to fade, and even the waves began to disappear, until all she could hear was a slight ringing in her ears. And then voices. Sara sighed and turned off the bathroom light, making her way back into the bedroom. She had forgotten how thin hotel walls were. Her neighbors, whoever they were, sounded anxious.

"….dehydrated," said one, a female voice.

The other one sounded like he was in agreement.

"…too long in the sun."

Sara smiled, and wondered if they were talking about their child. Not enough Coppertone and too much soda on the beach always made for an unhappy kid. Why was it that seasonal beachgoers never seemed to learn? She stretched out on top of the bedspread—she had processed too many hotel rooms to touch the sheets—and closed her eyes, listening for the conversation from next door. Their murmurs were strangely comforting, like waking up to the scent of Grissom's coffee. Only one wall away from normal life. Like the ocean waves, the voices faded in and out until Sara fell asleep.


	2. Sandshoe Blisters

**A/N: **I know these chapters are really short and weird, but I'm trying something different...they'll get longer. I'll add some plot, I swear! ;) And btw, the names of the chapters are songs. They aren't completely random.

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The ceiling was gray. The walls were gray. It was loud. It was blurry. Sara blinked, and felt sand on her eyelashes. Her mouth was like a dry sponge, like sandpaper. Every cell in her throat seemed to be shrinking, crying for water. She blinked once more and began to see the outlines of shapes. Someone was holding her hand. Someone in a black vest. Grissom. Sara kept her eyes on his vest for a very long time, just to make sure she wasn't misreading it. She felt him watching her before she even looked up, and when she did finally turn her eyes to him she felt her thirst cease, a little. If she tore her eyes from his, she knew she would fall away. But he didn't look away, and neither did she, and she was flying. There was a weight on her forehead, and it was cold, freezing out every thought of death. It was as if he was feeding her life energy through the warmth of his hand and the expression in his eyes. Sara wasn't sure how long they stayed like that, saying I love you silently over the persistent hum that surrounded her ears. But eventually the humming began to quiet, and Grissom's body began to blur around the edge. She stared at him a little more desperately, willing herself not to close her eyes. Was he saying her name? She couldn't tell. The warmth in her hand began to lessen. Her vision began to darken. And then she was back in her hotel room, clutching at the bedspread.

Sara shut her eyes tightly, but the pastel walls of the hotel room wouldn't disappear, and the sounds of the wind wouldn't give way for the strange humming. Finally she opened her eyes and propped herself up on her elbow, untangling her hand from the bedspread. It was sweaty. She sighed and wiped both hands against her jeans before running a hand through her hair. This was not the place to have nightmares. She could do that anywhere. The cobwebs of sleep still cluttering her mind, Sara stood unsteadily and walked toward her suitcase. She had tucked a map, dog-eared with nervous fiddling, into the first pocket. But before she could touch the zipper, the vibration of her cell phone called for her so suddenly that it was almost as if she herself were shuddering. She didn't have to check the ID to know who was calling.

"Sara?" he asked before she could utter a word.

"Gil." Her tongue felt rusty, as though she hadn't said his name in years.

"Sara, can you hear me?"

Sara frowned and pulled the phone from her ear. Full signal.

"I'm here. I can hear you. Can you hear me?"

"Sara?" He sounded urgent.

She repeated his name without success, inordinately annoyed. Why her cell phone didn't work was beyond comprehension. She didn't snap her phone shut until she heard the unrelenting beep of the dial tone. And even when Sara set it back on the bedside table, the beeping seemed to linger in her ears like a mosquito. She didn't call him back.

Slowly, Sara made her way back into the bathroom and unwrapped one of those little hotel room plastic cups with shaking hands. She thought of sand in her mouth, and the dryness in her throat, so that the sound of the tap water was almost unbearable. She filled the cup quickly and drank it down twice, three times. Again. Sara set the cup down biting her lip to keep from crying out. She was still thirsty. Still thirsty.


	3. Sweet and Low

At 6:00, Sara decided she needed to get out of the hotel. The light was just beginning to die, fading into pinks and blues, and the tide was low. She walked along the beach, weaving her way through a labyrinth of sandcastles and yelling kids, until the long string of beachside condos and hotels ended and gave way to restaurants and shops. The sky and ocean had turned dark and blended by the time she finally chose a place to stop. It was a tiny mom and pop café, one with big windows that revealed a Norman Rockwell-esque scene inside. There were white-aproned waitresses pouring coffee to satisfied old men reading newspapers, and happy families laughing over hamburgers and apple pie. The cashier smiled as she rang up a young couple with linked arms; a small boy slipped a quarter into a gumball machine. Sara felt the corners of her mouth turn up a bit. She stood outside the café for a few more minutes, admiring. When she finally pushed the door open and heard the musical jingle of a bell above her, she felt as though she were entering another realm. 

"Evening," called a beaming woman with a gray bun. 

Sara gave a weary smile, and let the woman, whose nametag read Marie, lead her to a booth.

Like a character on an outdated TV show, Marie removed a pen from behind her ear and shifted her weight to one foot before whipping out a pad of paper.

"Know what you'd like to drink? Some coffee, maybe?"

Coffee. How long had it been since she'd drunk coffee? 

"Sure," Sara answered. "Coffee sounds great." 

She was suddenly acutely aware that she didn't have a headache, didn't have a single one of the withdrawal symptoms she usually got in a day without coffee. 

Marie returned quickly, and set the mug in front of Sara cheerfully. 

"Fresh coffee. It's our specialty—you'll never taste better."

As Sara murmured her thanks, a portly man at the counter waved Marie over, and Sara was left to her own devices. 

She pulled out the map she'd stuffed hastily into her pocket, and took a tentative sip of the coffee as she unfolded it. Ten miles. Only ten miles to her childhood, and she knew the path like the back of her hand. Another sip of coffee. Sara ran a finger over the spot where she had spent so many years. 

"How's the coffee?" Marie was standing over her, smiling sympathetically.

Sara gazed into her cup. She hadn't really tasted it.

"Great," she answered. "Thanks."

Marie grinned. "Everyone says it's the best." She nodded toward Sara's map. "You got family there?"

Sara hesitated. "Yeah," she answered finally, and took a sip of coffee to be appreciative.

Marie shook her head dejectedly. 

"Well, that's really too bad."

Sara felt surprise jolt through her body.

"Too bad? Why?"

Marie looked uncomfortable. 

"Oh, honey. They're tearing that whole neighborhood down."

Sara shook her head.

"Tearing it down? Why? It's a nice neighborhood."

"They're adding on to the hospital. Need the extra space. Everybody's pretty torn up about it, but there's not much we can do."

Adding on to the hospital. Sara let out a bitter laugh.

Over the next half hour, Marie refilled Sara's cup and brought her a plate of eggs and toast "on the house", which Sara ate distractedly at Marie's motherly urging. When she finally got up to leave, the only the people in the café were ebullient teenagers, tanned and disorderly, returned from a day on the beach. Sara thanked Marie and began her long walk down the beach toward her hotel. 

She arrived at her hotel without even realizing it. It wasn't until Sara closed the door to her room that she was aware of how tired she was. Next door, her neighbors were in the middle of what sounded like a relaxed conversation. 

"…she's doing well," the man said.

"Yep," said the woman gladly. "Listen, I'm going downstairs to get a bite to eat. You want anything?"

The man said that he would love something to drink. 

Feeling as though she were walking underwater, Sara made her way slowly to her bathroom and turned on the light that made her skin look like a dead fish. She showered quickly, strangely bothered by the feeling of the water droplets against her skin, and fell into bed without bothering to check her phone for missed calls. She fell asleep in a way that was, somehow, truly as quick and as terrifying as falling. 

The room smelled like coffee. Had she made coffee? Sara opened her eyes. Where were the coral colored walls? Where was her suitcase? This room was white and sunny, and someone named Dr. Brown was watching her, sipping coffee. Sara realized, irritated, that she was dreaming. It was one of those dreams that came with an unsettling sense of déjà vu. 

"Hi, Ms. Sidle," Dr. Brown said. "I'm Dr. Brown."

Sara nodded. Her throat hurt. Her entire body hurt.

"Do you know where you are?"

Sara felt a pang of annoyance. In a nightmare. Where the fuck else would she be?

"The hospital," she muttered. Each word was a knife in her throat. 

Dr. Brown nodded approvingly.

"Very good. You've been through quite an ordeal, but you're going to be just fine. All you need is some rest."

Sara ignored him and closed her eyes, willing herself to wake up. This time, it worked. Dr. Brown's voice began to fade and contort, and then she was back in her hotel room. She was tired. She was tired, and she had come to California to rest. To recuperate, to find the things she needed to find. How could she possibly rest when her every moment of sleep was filled with these dreams? Groaning, Sara dragged herself to a sitting position and turned on the TV. Next door, her neighbors were silent. 


	4. Life in Disguise

Morning came. When the clock beside her bed turned to 9:00, Sara finally acknowledged that she would get no sleep. She dressed slowly, and wondered why every inch of her body ached. Exhaustion seemed to drip from her pores, and she considered going back to her little café. But her stomach recoiled at the thought of food. It was time, Sara decided finally, to go to the place she had come for. Once again, she imagined her childhood home being knocked to the ground with a bulldozer to make way for a hospital. The thought brought horror along with a strange sense of relief, and Sara quickened her pace toward the door. Out in the hallway, she leaned against the wall and closed her eyes as she waited for the elevator. She drank in the sounds of the hotel. The soft, steady beeping of someone's alarm clock. Footsteps. Murmuring. And then, a voice, one that seemed to come from far away.

"Ms. Sidle?" 

She kept her eyes closed.

"Sara?"

Sara sighed and opened her eyes. A man stood in front of her, small and wiry. His hair was dark and unkempt, his eyes wide and charming. He looked unsettlingly familiar. Sara searched for something to say, suddenly wondering why he knew her name.

"I'm Tim White," he explained with a small smile. "Your neighbor."

"Oh. Right. Hi," she stuttered, extending her hand. Tim took it and shook her hand heartily before producing a card. Her driver's license.

"You dropped this. It was outside your room," he explained genially, and Sara remembered his voice as the one that had helped her sleep, once. 

"Thank you," she murmured, taking her license. "I don't know how I could have dropped this."

Tim shrugged and smiled his disarming smile.

"Don't worry about it. All you need is some rest," he assured her.

Sara blinked and felt déjà vu wash over her once more. And then, finally, the elevator door opened, and she mumbled her goodbyes and watched the doors close on this small, smiling man in the white polo.

Sara drove through the California sunshine in silence, without even the radio to quiet her thoughts. She was frustrated. She was tired and frustrated. This was supposed to be her place of rest and renewal. But still, the things that haunted her hovered just beyond her reach. She thought distantly of Grissom, and the seventeen missed calls on her cell. Sara groaned in the silence of her car, appalled at her own bitchiness. She could still feel him watching her, worrying over her. His ineffable presence was Godlike and somewhat uncanny. Miles and miles away, sometimes Sara could even swear that she felt his hand on hers, his whispers in her ear. She missed him. And as much as she wanted to stay in California and find whatever it was she was missing, Sara knew with a burning apprehension that she would have to return to Vegas, to reality, as surely as the waves that cling to the sand must return to the sea. 

When she finally reached her old neighborhood, it was with a sense of foreboding. There was yellow caution tape, and construction workers yelling things in Spanish, and wreckage in the grass of what had used to be a quiet suburban neighborhood. Sara parked on an unoccupied street a few blocks away, and began to walk. She passed Roy Madison's old tree house and Ms. Peluski's prized daffodils. She stepped over the sidewalks where she had once drawn with chalk and crossed streets upon which she had ridden her bike. And then she was standing there, standing in front of her old house. It still had white paneling and a magnolia tree in the front yard. To the left and right of her house, there were bricks and wreckage. Her home stood there, lonely and decrepit, in the midst of the construction, and somehow the sun seemed to shine only upon this one lot. Sara drew in a deep breath. There was a buzzing in her ears. Inside this house was everything she needed to find and everything that would break her. She took a step forward, and was dizzy. Her muscles ached. Her throat was unbearably dry. Sara closed her eyes and opened them again. She began to walk forward toward her front door, but she couldn't walk fast enough. It was as though she was walking underwater. Her arms were numb, her legs were lead. Only her mind was truly awake, awake and screaming. _You need this, _it said. _You will never live in peace unless you do this. You can't run anymore. _After what seemed like hours, Sara managed to raise one arm and ring the doorbell. But it wasn't the ring she remembered. It was a beeping, a soft and steady beeping. The door was opening. But she couldn't see inside, everything was too dark. She was falling, her legs crumbling underneath her, hitting the floor, slipping away.

"Sara."

She kept her eyes closed. Nausea crept through her.

"Sara, can you open your eyes for me?"

It was Tim White's voice and, Sara realized with a particularly sharp pang of nausea, the voice of the doctor from her dream. Dr. Brown.

She opened her eyes and found him, whoever he was, sitting in front of her. His small form was tense, and his friendly eyes were expectant. She was once more in her nightmare of dull hospital walls and antiseptic smell.

"Sara." 

This voice was different, and agonizingly tender. She turned her head. Grissom was sitting beside her, both of his hands clasping her right one. He looked haggard and remorseful.

"How are you feeling?" 

Her stomach flipped again.

"Sick," she muttered. Grissom tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ears.

"That's normal," he murmured gently. "You'll be okay."

The nurse standing at the back of the room cleared her throat.

"I'll get a bedpan," she said. Sara closed her eyes. It was the voice of her other hotel neighbor, the one she had heard talking to Tim White, or Dr. Brown, or whoever the hell he was. Sara closed her eyes, feeling a remote but urgent need to go back to her childhood home and see behind the dark door. But she wouldn't wake up.

She heard the steady, familiar beeping, and realized that it was a hospital machine.

Memories began to infiltrate her senses and tangle with thoughts of California.

The desert.

A red car.

Thirst.

And it hadn't been a dream. This wasn't a dream.

Sara twisted away, sick, just as the nurse shoved the bedpan under her. She vomited and then dry heaved for a few moments, feeling miserably dehydrated. 

When she finally fell back onto the pillow, Grissom took her hand again, quiet and unshaken. 

"How long have I been asleep?" she asked. Her voice was dry and scratchy. 

"A couple days, on and off," Dr. Brown said. "The pain meds will do that."

She turned to Grissom. "Natalie Davis?"

Grissom looked away, as if the name pained him. "We got her."

Sara nodded and closed her eyes again, still disconcerted by her drugged reality flip.

"I had a weird dream."

She heard Grissom give a rueful half laugh.

"Feel like talking about it?"

She shook her head.

"Not really."

Grissom smoothed her hair again.

"Well, I'm glad you're back."

Sara smiled and squeezed his hand, and the minutes passed that way. Hours later, she saw the rest of the team, and felt safe. Days later, she came home and curled up against Grissom in their big bed, and didn't dream. Months later, Sara left her vest in the locker room and her goodbye with Judy and her apology on Grissom's lips. She went to California. 


End file.
